A New Garment for a New Era
The Chinese space program has advanced at a remarkable pace. Following the successful establishment of the Tiangong space station in low Earth orbit, the nation’s focus has shifted to a new, more challenging destination: the Moon. This ambitious leap requires a new generation of hardware, from powerful rockets to reliable crew capsules and sophisticated lunar landers. It also demands one of the most complex pieces of personal equipment ever engineered: a lunar spacesuit.
This new suit, named “Wangyu” (望月), which translates to “Gazing at the Moon,” represents a significant engineering undertaking for the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA). It is not merely an update to existing technology. Instead, it is a purpose-built system designed from the ground up to meet the unique and hostile conditions of the lunar surface. The Wangyu suit is the personal spacecraft that will allow Chinese taikonauts to step onto another world, conduct scientific research, and begin establishing a long-term human presence. Its development is a cornerstone of China’s plan to land astronauts on the Moon before 2030 and establish the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS).
This article explores the Wangyu spacesuit, examining the reasons for its creation, the immense technical hurdles its designers face, its known design features, and its central role in the future of human space exploration.
The Mandate for a Lunar Suit
China’s experience with spacewalks, or extra-vehicular activities (EVAs), is built upon the Feitian spacesuit. The Feitian has proven itself to be a capable and robust system, enabling taikonauts to perform numerous EVAs outside the Tiangong space station. These operations have been essential for assembling and upgrading the station, testing equipment, and giving taikonauts valuable experience working in the vacuum of space. The Feitian was designed for a very specific environment: microgravity.
Operating on the Moon presents a completely different set of problems that a microgravity suit like the Feitian isn’t built to handle. The development of the Wangyu is a direct response to these new and unforgiving challenges.
The Orbital Predecessor: The Feitian Suit
The Feitian spacesuit is a marvel of engineering in its own right. It’s a semi-rigid suit, meaning it combines a hard upper torso component with softer fabric limbs. This design makes it relatively easy to put on and take off in the confines of an airlock – astronauts essentially “climb in” through the back. The suit provides a pure oxygen atmosphere, protects against the vacuum, and shields the taikonaut from the extreme temperature swings of orbit, where the difference between direct sunlight and shadow can be hundreds of degrees.
In orbit, weight is not a concern. A 280-pound (130 kg) suit is weightless. The primary challenges are mobility and managing inertia. The taikonaut moves by pulling themselves along handrails, and the suit’s joints are designed to allow the arms to float freely and perform tasks. The boots are simple restraints designed to lock into footpads on the station’s exterior. The Feitian is a personal maneuvering unit for a weightless environment.
Using it on the Moon would be impractical and dangerous. Its mass would become weight – about 46 pounds (21 kg) in the Moon’s one-sixth gravity. This weight, coupled with the suit’s high center of gravity (due to the backpack), would make a taikonaut extremely unstable and prone to falling. Its joints are not designed for walking, bending, or kneeling, and its boots offer no traction.
The Lunar Challenge
The Moon is a fundamentally different world. Its environment is uniquely hostile, imposing requirements that drove the Wangyu’s design from its inception.
Gravity’s Pull
The first and most obvious difference is gravity. While one-sixth of Earth’s gravity may seem light, it has massive implications for suit design. The entire weight of the suit and the astronaut rests on the feet, not the waist harness of an orbital suit. The Wangyu must support its own weight (likely over 220 pounds, or 100 kg, on Earth) and allow a human to walk, bend, and work inside it.
This demands a completely different approach to mobility. The suit’s joints, especially in the legs, hips, and ankles, must be complex bearings that move smoothly under load. The suit’s total weight is a major constraint, as every kilogram adds to the taikonaut’s fatigue. Designers must also carefully manage the suit’s center of gravity. A taikonaut who falls on the Moon in a pressurized suit may find it extremely difficult, or even impossible, to get back up without assistance. The Wangyu must be designed to make walking feel as natural as possible and to help the astronaut maintain balance.
The Dust Problem
The single greatest environmental threat on the Moon is lunar regolith, commonly known as lunar dust. This isn’t like dust on Earth. It’s the product of billions of years of micrometeoroid impacts shattering lunar rock. The result is a layer of fine, abrasive particles with the consistency of flour but the sharpness of microscopic glass shards.
During the Apollo program, this dust proved to be a nightmare. It is electrostatically charged by solar radiation, so it clings to everything. It infiltrated suit bearings, causing them to grind and seize up. It scratched visors, reducing visibility. It contaminated the lunar module, causing respiratory irritation for the astronauts when they removed their helmets.
The Wangyu’s design must prioritize dust mitigation. This means developing advanced seals for every joint, bearing, and connection port. The outer layer of the suit will likely use specialized fabrics designed to repel dust or make it easier to clean. Connectors for life support and tools must be designed to operate without jamming. Given that China’s missions call for EVAs lasting up to eight hours and repeated use of the suits during a surface stay, failure to manage lunar dust could jeopardize the entire mission.
Extreme Temperatures
Like in orbit, the Moon has no atmosphere to moderate temperatures. In direct sunlight, the surface can reach 250°F (120°C). In shadow, it plummets to -208°F (-130°C). An astronaut working in a crater or in the shadow of the lunar lander could have their feet in extreme cold while their helmet is in searing heat.
The Wangyu’s thermal control system has to be far more robust than an orbital suit’s. It must actively manage these temperature differences, drawing heat away from the astronaut’s body while also preventing that heat from being lost too quickly to the cold shadows. The suit’s outer layers, known as the Thermal Micrometeoroid Garment, must reflect intense solar radiation while also insulating the taikonaut from the cold.
Radiation and Micrometeoroids
Without a magnetic field or a thick atmosphere, the Moon’s surface is constantly bombarded by galactic cosmic rays, solar radiation, and tiny, high-velocity particles called micrometeoroids. The Wangyu suit must provide protection against this. The Thermal Micrometeoroid Garment includes layers of tough, ballistic-resistant material to stop small particles. The helmet’s visor assembly will include special filtered shields, likely with a thin layer of gold, to reflect harmful radiation and prevent the sun’s unfiltered light from blinding the taikonaut.
Design and Engineering of the Wangyu
While the China Manned Space Agency has not revealed every technical detail of the Wangyu, the fundamental principles of spacesuit design are well-understood. The suit is, in effect, a miniature, human-shaped spacecraft. It must provide everything a human body needs to survive, all while being mobile enough to permit useful work.
Publicly shown prototypes and models indicate the Wangyu is a semi-rigid suit, similar in concept to the Feitian and NASA’s suits. It features a hard upper torso (HUT) that forms the core of the suit, with more flexible, fabric-based limbs attached via high-tech bearing assemblies.
Architecture of a Personal Spacecraft
The hard upper torso is the “chassis” of the suit. It’s a rigid fiberglass or composite material shell that supports the other components. The helmet, arms, and lower torso assembly all attach to it. Most importantly, it serves as the mounting point for the portable life support system.
This design has several advantages. It’s durable, provides excellent upper-body protection, and simplifies the process of putting the suit on (donning) and taking it off (doffing). It also provides a solid, reliable structure for mounting connections for air, water, and power.
The lower-torso assembly, from the waist down, is where the Wangyu must radically differ from the Feitian. It requires a complex hip and waist bearing to allow the taikonaut to bend over and pick up samples. The knees and ankles must also be articulated with sophisticated, constant-volume joints. These joints are designed to bend without changing the suit’s internal volume, which prevents the taikonaut from having to fight against the suit’s internal pressure just to take a step.
The Life Support System (PLSS)
The “backpack” is the suit’s engine room. Officially called the Portable Life Support System (PLSS), it contains all the consumables and machinery needed to keep the taikonaut alive for an eight-hour EVA.
Providing Breathable Air
Humans inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide (CO2). A sealed suit must manage this process. The PLSS contains a tank of high-pressure oxygen, which is fed into the suit at a controlled rate to maintain a stable internal pressure. This pressure, typically around 4.3 psi (30 kPa) of pure oxygen, is lower than Earth’s sea-level pressure (14.7 psi). This lower pressure makes the suit more flexible, but it requires the taikonaut to “pre-breathe” pure oxygen for a period before an EVA to purge nitrogen from their bloodstream and prevent decompression sickness.
The exhaled CO2 is toxic and must be removed. A fan inside the suit circulates the air, pulling the warm, moist, CO2-laden air from the helmet area and pushing it into the PLSS. There, it passes through a system that scrubs the CO2. Older suits used lithium hydroxide canisters, which capture CO2 chemically but are used up and must be replaced. Modern systems, likely used in the Wangyu, are often “regenerable,” using materials that can capture CO2 and then vent it into space, allowing for much longer and more frequent use.
Keeping Cool
The human body generates a lot of heat, especially during hard work. In a perfectly insulated suit, this heat would build up rapidly, leading to overheating and heatstroke. The Wangyu’s primary cooling system is a garment worn next to the skin.
This garment, known as a Liquid Cooling and Ventilation Garment (LCVG), is essentially a set of long underwear woven with a network of thin, flexible plastic tubes. Cool water is continuously pumped from the PLSS, flows through these tubes, absorbs the taikonaut’s body heat, and then flows back to the backpack.
In the backpack, the heat is removed using a device called a sublimator. A sublimator takes advantage of a physical principle: water in a vacuum doesn’t melt, it “sublimates” (turns directly from ice into vapor). The warm water from the LCVG passes through the sublimator, which has porous plates exposed to space. A small amount of feedwater is allowed to freeze on these plates. The suit’s excess heat is transferred to this ice, causing it to sublimate and vent into space as water vapor, taking the heat with it. This is a very effective way to dump heat in a vacuum.
Power and Communication
The entire suit is electric. The PLSS contains a high-capacity lithium-ion battery pack that powers the fans, pumps, radio, and any lights or cameras. A sophisticated communications system allows the taikonaut to talk to their EVA partner, the lunar lander, and mission control back on Earth.
The suit also features a “display and control module” – a chest-mounted unit with switches, dials, and a small screen. This allows the taikonaut to monitor the suit’s status (oxygen levels, battery life, temperature) and make adjustments, such as changing the cooling level.
Layers of Protection
The “fabric” parts of the suit are actually a complex, multi-layer composite. Each layer serves a specific function.
The Inner Layers
Closest to the taikonaut is the LCVG. Directly over that is the pressure bladder. This is an airtight, urethane-coated layer that holds the oxygen pressure. It’s shaped by the layer above it, the restraint layer.
The Restraint Layer
The pressure bladder, if left on its own, would swell up like a stiff, round balloon, making movement impossible. The restraint layer, made of a tough, non-stretch fabric like Dacron, is what gives the suit its human shape. It’s tailored precisely to allow the joints to bend only where they are supposed to. The constant-volume joints are integrated into this layer.
The Thermal Micrometeoroid Garment (TMG)
The outermost layer is the TMG. This is the white, iconic part of the spacesuit. Its white color is chosen to reflect as much solar radiation as possible. The TMG itself is a “space blanket” made of multiple, paper-thin layers separated by a vacuum. These layers, often made of aluminized Mylar or other insulating materials, are extremely effective at stopping heat from moving in or out. The very outermost layer is a robust, abrasion-resistant fabric (like a blend of Gore-Tex, Kevlar, and Nomex) that protects the delicate inner layers from micrometeoroids and, importantly for Wangyu, from the abrasive lunar dust.
Mobility and Dexterity
A suit can provide perfect life support, but it’s useless if the astronaut can’t work. Mobility is a top priority for Wangyu.
Joints and Bearings
The suit’s “skeleton” is its system of bearings. These are airtight, rotating rings that allow the arms to swivel at the shoulder and wrist, and the legs to move at the hip. The Wangyu will feature bearings at the shoulders, elbows, wrists, waist, hips, knees, and ankles. These bearings must be sealed to hold pressure but rotate smoothly under a person’s weight. Protecting these bearings from lunar dust is one of the design’s most significant challenges, likely involving layered “dust-covers” or wipers.
The Helmet and Visor
The helmet is a clear, high-impact polycarbonate “bubble” that provides a wide field of view. This is attached to the hard upper torso by a sealed neck ring. Over this bubble is the External Visor Assembly. This assembly includes several shields. A “sun visor” acts as sunglasses. A protective visor shields the main bubble from scratches. And a gold-coated visor reflects solar radiation and protects the taikonaut’s eyes. The helmet also contains the communications headset and a system to direct oxygen flow across the visor to prevent it from fogging up.
Boots and Gloves
The hands and feet are the hardest parts to design. The gloves must be flexible enough to allow a taikonaut to grip tools, flip switches, and pick up rocks, yet they are essentially personalized pressure vessels. They are made of multiple layers, including a pressure bladder, a restraint layer, and a TMG. They often have customized molded silicone fingertips to provide some sense of touch.
The lunar boots are also complex. They consist of an inner pressure bootie, which is part of the suit, and a rugged outer over-boot. This over-boot has a thick, insulated sole to protect the taikonaut’s feet from the hot or cold lunar surface. The sole’s tread pattern is carefully designed to provide traction in the loose, powdery regolith.
Development and Testing
Creating the Wangyu is a multi-year process involving advanced research in materials science, robotics, and human physiology. This effort is led by the Astronaut Center of China (ACC), the same institution responsible for taikonaut training and the Feitian suit.
From Concept to Prototype
The suit’s design didn’t start with fabric. It started with computers. Engineers use sophisticated computer-aided design (CAD) and human ergonomic modeling to create a “digital taikonaut.” They can simulate how the suit will move, where it will bend, and how a person of a specific size will fit inside. This digital design phase allows for rapid iteration, testing ideas for joint placement and mobility before any hardware is built.
At the same time, material scientists work to develop new fabrics and composites. They need materials that are lighter, stronger, and more resistant to dust than anything used before. This includes new bearing lubricants that won’t freeze in shadow or break down in a vacuum, and new textiles for the outer layer that can repel the clinging lunar dust.
Physical prototypes are then built based on these digital models. These prototypes are tested by taikonauts to provide feedback on comfort, mobility, and ease of use. This feedback is used to refine the design in a continuous loop of building, testing, and improving.
The Role of the Astronaut Center of China
The ACC is the hub for all these activities. It houses the design labs, manufacturing facilities, and, most importantly, the testing facilities. The taikonauts who will one day wear these suits on the Moon are directly involved in their development. They are the test subjects, providing the human feedback that computer modelscan’t. They test how easy it is to grip a hammer, how far they can bend, and whether the controls on the chest pack are easy to reach.
Testing on Earth
Simulating the Moon on Earth is impossible, but engineers can simulate parts of the lunar environment to test different aspects of the suit.
Neutral Buoyancy
To simulate reduced gravity, taikonauts wear weighted-down versions of the Wangyu suit in a massive underwater facility, similar to NASA’s Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory. By carefully adjusting the suit’s buoyancy, technicians can make it “feel” as though it weighs exactly what it would on the Moon. In this environment, taikonauts practice walking, falling, and getting back up. They test their ability to climb ladders on the lunar lander mock-up and use tools to collect samples. This testing is essential for refining the suit’s joint design and center of gravity.
Vacuum Chambers
To test the suit’s life support and thermal systems, prototypes are placed in large vacuum chambers. These chambers pump out all the air to simulate the vacuum of space. Inside, powerful lamps can simulate the intense heat of the sun, while plates cooled with liquid nitrogen simulate the cold of shadow. A taikonaut inside the suit can perform tasks on a treadmill to generate body heat, allowing engineers to confirm that the LCVG and PLSS can keep them cool and comfortable. These tests also verify that the suit’s seals are airtight.
Regolith Simulants
To tackle the dust problem, the ACC uses “regolith simulants.” This is a special, manufactured material made from volcanic ash on Earth that is crushed and processed to mimic the size, sharpness, and properties of real lunar dust. Suit components – bearings, seals, fabrics, and connectors – are exposed to large quantities of this simulant in test chambers. They are operated repeatedly to see what breaks, what jams, and what wears down. This “torture testing” is the only way to ensure the Wangyu’s components are durable enough for the lunar surface.
Wangyu in the Chinese Lunar Program
The Wangyu spacesuit is not an isolated project. It is a critical component of a much larger, interconnected architecture for China’s manned lunar program. It must interface perfectly with the other elements of the mission.
The Mission: Landing on the Moon
The Chinese plan to land on the Moon involves two separate rocket launches using the new Long March 10 heavy-lift rocket. One rocket will launch the lunar lander, named “Lanyue,” and the other will launch the “Mengzhou” crewed spacecraft. These two vehicles will meet and dock in lunar orbit.
Two taikonauts will then transfer from the Mengzhou to the Lanyue, taking their Wangyu suits with them.They will descend to the lunar surface. Once on the ground, they will don their suits inside the lander’s cabin, depressurize, and open the hatch. The Wangyu is their only lifeline once they step outside. The suits are being designed to support EVAs of up to eight hours, allowing for significant exploration and scientific work during their surface stay. After their mission is complete, they will return to the lander, ascend to lunar orbit, and rejoin the third taikonaut aboard the Mengzhou for the journey home.
The Taikonauts Who Will Wear It
China has been selecting and training its fourth batch of taikonauts, including, for the first time, individuals for the roles of mission payload specialists. The taikonauts selected for the lunar missions will undergo an intense, specialized training regimen. A significant part of this training will involve the Wangyu suit. They must become experts in its operation, able to diagnose and solve problems on their own, hundreds of thousands of miles from Earth. They will spend hundreds of hours in the underwater training pool and vacuum chambers, rehearsing every moment of their lunar EVA, from the first step down the ladder to the collection of geological samples.
Surface Operations
The primary job of the first lunar taikonauts will be science and exploration. The Wangyu suit is being designed to enable this work. Its gloves must allow the dexterity to use hammers, drills, and collection scoops. The suit will have attachment points for carrying tools and sample bags. High-definition cameras mounted on the suit will broadcast the taikonauts’ activities to the world and to scientists on the ground, who can help guide their exploration.
These initial missions are also precursors to the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), China’s planned lunar base. The Wangyu, and its future variants, will be the workhorse suits for assembling and maintaining this outpost.
Comparing Lunar Suits
The Wangyu benefits from decades of lessons learned from previous and contemporary spacesuit programs.
The Apollo Legacy
The Apollo program’s A7L suit was the first and, so far, only suit to be used by humans on the Moon. It was a masterpiece of 1960s technology, a soft suit with rubber-bellows joints. It kept 12 astronauts alive, but it had limitations. Mobility was poor; the “bunny hop” adopted by astronauts was a way to compensate for the suit’s stiff legs. The suit was also not designed for durability, with each suit being custom-made and used for only one mission. The dust problem was managed, but not solved.
The Wangyu’s designers have studied the A7L’s successes and failures. The semi-rigid design of the Wangyu, with its hard upper torso and advanced bearings, should offer far superior lower-body mobility, reducing astronaut fatigue and making it easier to walk, bend, and recover from falls.
NASA’s Modern Approach
For its Artemis program, NASA has taken a new approach by contracting with commercial companies to develop the next generation of lunar suits. Two companies, Axiom Space and Collins Aerospace, are building competing suits.
These suits, like the Wangyu, prioritize mobility. They feature advanced walking kinematics and hip bearings to allow for natural movement. A key feature of these American suits is a “rear-entry” design, where the astronaut climbs in through a hatch in the back of the hard upper torso. This hatch is the PLSS backpack. This design makes it easier to don the suit without assistance and helps contain lunar dust, as the dusty suit can be “docked” to the outside of a rover or habitat, allowing the astronaut to climb out without bringing the suit inside.
Public models of the Wangyu appear to retain a more traditional design, likely an evolution of the Feitian’s, but it’s certain that its designers are focused on solving the same problems of mobility and dust control.
Key Differentiators
The Wangyu represents China’s philosophy of technological independence. By developing its own suit, Chinais not reliant on any other nation. The suit is being developed in parallel with its lander and rockets, ensuring all systems are integrated from the start. The design likely emphasizes robustness, reliability, and serviceability. Unlike the Apollo suits, the Wangyu is intended to be reusable, supporting multiple EVAs on a single mission and potentially being refurbished for future flights. This focus on durability is essential for the long-term goal of the ILRS, where suits will need to function for months or even years with limited maintenance.
Future Innovations and Challenges
The development of the first-generation Wangyu is just the beginning. The challenges of a permanent lunar base will require even more advanced suits.
The Evolving Threat of Lunar Dust
While the Wangyu is being designed to resist lunar dust, long-term exposure is still a major unknown. The abrasive particles could wear down seals and bearings over weeks or months of use. Future suit designs may incorporate active dust-mitigation technologies, such as electrostatic systems that actively repel dust particles from the suit’s surface.
Beyond the First Landing
The first missions will last only a few days. The International Lunar Research Station envisions crews living on the Moon for months. This requires a new class of spacesuit. Suits will need to be designed for easy maintenance and repair on the Moon, without being sent back to Earth. They may feature modular components that can be easily swapped out. They will also need to be far more durable, capable of supporting hundreds of EVAs.
Integrating with the Lunar Ecosystem
Future suits will be one part of a larger lunar “ecosystem.” The Wangyu will need to interface with the Lanyue lander, but its successors will need to plug into lunar rovers for recharging or to replenish oxygen. They will dock with habitat airlocks and connect to scientific instruments. The suit will evolve from a standalone spacecraft into a wearable interface for a larger lunar base.
Summary
The Wangyu spacesuit is far more than just clothing. It is a symbol of China’s technological prowess and its deep commitment to becoming a major spacefaring nation. It is a complex, mobile life-support system designed to overcome the extreme challenges of the lunar environment – challenges that have not been faced by human engineers in over half a century. From the grinding, clinging lunar regolith to the one-sixth gravity and wild temperature swings, every aspect of the suit’s design is a solution to a potentially lethal problem.
As China prepares to send its taikonauts to the Moon, the success of their ambitious program will rest on the shoulders of the men who wear the Wangyu. This personal spacecraft is the key that will unlock the lunar surface, enabling a new generation of explorers to walk, work, and, one day, live on another world.
